Store your data in the cloud and have it accessible to you from any computer, anywhere. That’s the pitch we hear more and more from companies like Apple, Google and Microsoft. So how is it that all of these companies allow Outlook for Mac 2011 to remain absurdly earthbound?
I’m a long-time Outlook user on Windows, now working with Outlook full-time on the Mac. Even though Gmail is my email provider (the Google Apps version of it), I find Outlook a better way to interact with Gmail than using Gmail directly through the web.
No, I’m not crazy (but if you love Gmail’s web interface, more power to you). In a future column, I’ll explain exactly why Outlook (either for Windows or Mac) is a perfect paring with Gmail, especially for its excellent offline support and the easy ability to open and manage multiple email windows.
That’s a story for another time. For now, the point is that when it comes to syncing email, Outlook loves the cloud. When it comes to syncing other data that users create and store in Outlook, the program falls short on the Mac-side. Painfully short. Continue reading
D.S. SENANAYAKE COLLEGE COMPUTER SOCIETY 